Sometimes NBC’s First Read is surprisingly smart (via):
*** Romney has more of a Bain problem than the Acela Corridor realizes: Ever since the Obama campaign began its Bain hit, there has been near universal agreement among elites that the hits were either “not working,” or “unfair,” or both. But as we’ve said before and we’ll say again: The Bain attacks aren’t meant to sway folks in NY and DC, but folks in three crucial battleground states: Ohio, Iowa, and Wisconsin. The whole point of this campaign by the Obama folks is to paint Romney as an out-of-touch Wall Street CEO or worse, one of the Bobs from “Office Space. And while the Romney campaign has comforted itself with the criticism of the Obama attacks by other Democrats (Booker, Rendell etc.), the campaign has done little to fix the larger image issue. So far, the Romney campaign has made this argument: Any attack on Bain is an attack on America’s free enterprise system. But how does it explain that Bain and its partners often made money, even if the firms they took over went belly up? And how do they now explain this Milken association? Does it keep using the “free enterprise” line? Or does it need to do something else?
Real Murkins don’t like vulture capitalism. Wealthy east coast “journalists” do because that nice man from private equity sat next to them in Aspen and invited them to his Hamptons house.
It is that simple.
Violet
So, so, so true. Absolutely right.
Villago Delenda Est
The vermin of the Village simply do not understand the simple folk of flyover country, who are growing to loathe the Ferengi parasite that is the synthezoid Rmoney.
Davis X. Machina
Any attack on Bain is an attack on America’s free enterprise system.
Any bad review of MD20/20 is an attack on America’s wine industry.
Valdivia
I am actually very confident that by the time the Obama team really unleashes everything they have in Sept-Oct the Village will be tired of the long months of Romney fellation. They will need a change of narrative and nothing better for that to happen in time for the election. Maybe I am just naive.
butler
The whole point of this campaign by the Obama folks is to paint Romney as an out-of-touch Wall Street CEO or worse, one of the Bobs from “Office Space.
Personally I’d take the latter before the former, but that might be only based on their comedic potential.
Steve in DC
This news is hilarious
http://www.politico.com/playbook/0612/playbook1828.html
DOD contractors have said they are going to start firing their staff (LHM says 123,000) before the elections if defense spending gets cut. The corporations are really coming out swinging.
Violet
People are smart enough to understand that being a venture capitalist is not the same thing as running a business. By this point, pretty much EVERYONE has either had some experience with a venture capital group buying out a company a then shutting it down or ruining it, whether it’s a company they worked for or a family member or friend did, or it’s just a company they liked and a takeover completely destroyed it. People know what it looks like, how it works and who ends up better off. Hint: it ain’t the little guy or the customer.
Venture capitalism is just another way of saying “rich Wall Street types” and people are still pretty ticked off at the rich guys on Wall Street.
gene108
Also, too the “nice man” went to college with “journalists” and have been friends ever since, even though the “nice man” went to work on Wall Street, while the “journalist” worked as a political reporter in D.C.; a compelling story of maintaining long distance friendships over several decades.
I think that’s a big issue for a guy like Booker, because he probably has had several classmates end up on Wall Street.
mistermix
Funny how notable it is that this simple, true observation is so counter to the conventional wisdom.
eric
My take: EVERYONE likes to think he or she is as smart or smarter than public decision makers (campaign heads or sports head coaches). In general, they are not. (See, however, Green, Dennis; Shrum, Bob.) When Mitt fails to catch Obama after the debates, we will start to see the MSM sniping at that strategy choices made by Romney. Right now Obama’s people are going to take it for not leading by 50 percentage points. Obama’s campaign people are really smart. I dont always agree with the politics, but they know how to run a campaign. They will out work Romney’s people and Obama is going to swamped Mitt at the debates. Now that Mitt is NOT running to the center, Obama will point out all of the anti-independent positions Mitt has taken and this will put him in a vise. Looking forward to that.
TOP123
All true, but there are even plenty of people in Fairfield County with Ivy degrees and friends on Wall Street–heck, some themselves on Wall Street–who think Romney and his like are leeches. All of which really shows that the Village journos really are psychopaths.
Steeplejack
@Steve in DC:
That’s interesting, because I assume they have contractual deadlines and performance goals they have to meet, regardless of how many empty chairs they have, and, golly, there could be financial penalties associated with failure.
David Koch
/fixed
amk
@Steve in DC: So ? That’s the whole idea. These MIC leeches have to be killed at some point. The skilled workers will be fine. They’ll be in absorbed in other industries. So as usual, your concern is trash.
Steve
The political media sees everything as a partisan food fight. In their eyes, if some Democrat disagrees with Obama, then Obama automatically loses and now the storyline is about Democrats in disarray rather than what Obama said.
But that’s not how real people work. They hear the substance of what Obama says and they make up their own mind about it. They don’t wait for Cory Booker to tell them how they feel, and if they think the attack makes a fair point, they’re not going to change their minds just because not all Democrats are unanimously behind the attack.
General Stuck
This surprises me. But in a nice way
WereBear
Have you SEEN our public decisions makers?
Linnaeus
Real ‘Murkins might not like vulture capitalism, but the game’s rigged such that it matters less and less what they think.
TOP123
@General Stuck: Perhaps NH is benefiting from early local exposure to the infectious strain?
Steve in DC
@amk:
Well, it would be an economic hit and would shake up the election. It would also decimate the blue part of VA (virtually all defense spending) and turn the state redder than Texas once you fired all the educated liberals that depend on it.
I find it funny, I mean I’ll laugh if they do it and they just fire thousands of people before the election to tank the economy. But I wouldn’t say it’s good for the people losing their jobs or incumbants this fall.
Walker
Even Kevin Drum was pushing the “Bain is bad for Obama” nonsense a while back. Has Kevin always been a centrist tool, or only since his move to Mother Jones?
eric
@WereBear: have you seen our public? ;)
eric
@Walker: seems to dislike incivility or what we call dems fighting back hard.
Citizen_X
@Steve in DC: Oh, that’s cute. “We could continue fulfilling our contracts and making money, but we prefer to stamp our feet and cut our own dicks off out of spite.” You go ahead and do that, defense contractors!
piratedan
all I gotta say is that Obama keeps running ads like the one featured here a couple of days ago (Stage?), those ads have impact, that guy looks like an everyday ordinary guy and his words and its message are incredibly powerful. This makes this election choice pretty clear, imho, you can vote for the guy who doesn’t know you, doesn’t care who you are and if he can make a buck by closing down where you work in order to make a profit, he’ll do so with that being his priority. You want to believe that he’ll change who he is or that all of that we need to run this government like a business is simply bullshit since that’s all he got. It all seems to depend on how many wannabe lackeys we have out there that wanna ride the R gravy train.
Elmo
I would just like to say that I am actually reading this ON the Acela (biz trip to Philly, ugh) and I think it’s spot on.
Gin & Tonc
@Violet: I believe you’re misunderstanding venture capital, and unfortunately confusing it with private equity, or what is often called vulture capital. Venture capital firms are not pure as the driven snow, but are generally a force for good, as their role is to invest in startup-stage companies to try to help them grow. Most initial capital in, say, Google, Facebook, etc. comes from venture capital firms, which look to cash out reasonably soon. They are not in the business of taking over established (failing or otherwise) companies.
The Moar You Know
@Steve in DC: This, my friend, is what we call an “idle threat”.
Non-performance of a contract will not only lose your contract – especially if you had control over the circumstances that resulted in that non-performance – but in short order will lose you your ability to get any future contracts.
Won’t happen.
Jose Padilla
Can anybody give an example of Bain Capital under Romney saving a failing company? You know, company on its last legs, Mitt comes and makes the tough, smart decisions, turns it around so it’s a money maker. Mitt saves jobs, etc. Even one example?
MattF
It’s not just flyover country. I’ve met otherwise-conservative east coasters who just go quiet when the subject turns to the Banksters. I think Villagers just don’t realize how much bad feeling there is everywhere about this. And I think Obama’s campaign is doing exactly what it should be doing by calling it out at every opportunity.
Valdivia
@Steeplejack:
totally OT but I saw the Montalbano episode last night. so good.
Kay
@piratedan:
It’s so bizarre to me that Stage has turned into this national political issue, because we had one here, for years. Never in a million years did I think “Mitt Romney, Master of the Universe” would somehow be connected to one-step-below JC Penney, Stage.
Did Marc Halperin actually say “Stage”? I hope so. He wouldn’t be caught dead in one.
Citizen_X
Speaking of Halperin, he said today about the ACA decision that “whatever the court rules, it’s bad for the President” (h/t to ronathan richardson in an earlier thread).
So Halperin is now officially in his “this is good news…for Mitt Romney!” phase for the rest of the campaign.
Elmo
@The Moar You Know:
Actual Layoffs won’t, but notices will go out with the excuse that they are complying with the WARN Act.
Linda Featheringill
@piratedan:
The building your own stage ad is very powerful and makes a strong statement about the dignity of workers.
ETA:
Am I confused about which ad is under discussion?
Zach
Romney’s campaign is so out-of-touch on economic issues. All they had to do was watch Bush in 2000. The debates in particular. That is how you campaign on tax cuts for the rich. You never say that’s what you’re doing — you’re given the same tax cut to everyone! It’s just fair! You don’t defend it as tax cuts on “job creators” because if the Obama campaign does anything right at all it will be convincing people in swing states that every time he says “job creators” he means “rich people.”
Commenting at Balloon Juice since 1937
@Valdivia: Mad Dog LIBEL!!!
Hawes
Bonus points for the “two Bobs” reference.
If Romney gets spotted wearing suspenders and a belt, we may have a winner.
AliceBlue
@Valdivia:
Conventional wisdom says that this election is going to be a nail-biter, and most of the time I agree. Other times I get the feeling that Obama is going to bury Willard in November (in the Electoral College anyway).
A girl can dream, can’t she?
The Moar You Know
@Elmo: I get that part, but those folks know, just as I do, that there will be no layoffs.
Especially not at Lockheed, the DoD employee’s sure-thing early retirement program.
TOP123
@MattF: Mmm hmm. Also, whatever it might seem like in the media, there are plenty of WSers and other ‘fiscal conservatives’ who didn’t vote for McCain because of Palin, and are desperately needing Romney to swing Waaaay back (on issues other than tax cuts) on some of the scary stuff. Sadly, they tend to live in safe states like NY, NJ, and Conn.
ETA: and their numbers are tiny.
Roy G.
I thought that Mittens was Oliver Stone’s inspiration for Gordon Gekko in Wall Street. That movie is pretty much Bain Capital’s M.O.
Steeplejack
@Valdivia:
Yeah. I’m amazed how good the series is. There are only a few clunkers in 22 (24?) feature-length episodes, and even then you’ve got the scenery, the good-looking (but realistic) people and the food. Can’t lose.
Steeplejack
@Kay:
It’s not the store. The ad is the one that was front-paged here a couple of days ago about workers at a company being ordered to construct a stage for a company-wide meeting–at which they were all fired.
Here it is, from Saturday.
catclub
@Kay: I think the ad being discussed was where the guys were building a stage that was also their own coffin. That ad.
I know nothing about any connection of Stage — the clothing store — to Bain.
Bubblegum Tate
@TOP123:
Indeed there are. Fairfield County isn’t quite as douchey as you might think. It’s for sure douchey (Greenwich and New Canaan are in-fucking-sufferable), but it’s not an impenetrable hive of Gordon Gekkos and teabaggers.
Southern Beale
The funniest thing of all about this has been the lame attempt by GOP hacks to say “outsourcing” isn’t the same thing as “offshoring.” See you’ve just misunderstood this whole time what “outsourcing” means! Obama has “outsourced jobs to Nebraska!”
Or in other words, who are you gonna believe? The GOP or your lying eyes?
TOP123
@Bubblegum Tate: You forgot Darien. ;)
Generally, not as many teabaggers as the national average, more Gekkos. Sadly plenty of Christie type Rs.
And how the hell Nan Hayworth ended up in Congress across the line…
Valdivia
@AliceBlue:
that’s where I am at most of the time too. :)
@Steeplejack:
yes, the scene with the eggs for sale woman yesterday was perfectly staged.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@The Moar You Know:
The problem for Lockheed is the DOD get Congressional approval and awards them Lockheed a contract and then the Conservatards in the House turn around and refuse to fund it. Even if Lockheed fills the contract the DOD will refuse acceptance until they get funding.
I work in defense. The Teartard house has been an utter disaster for defense work.
piratedan
@Linda Featheringill: that was my thought Linda too, the idea that one of your last acts for your job is to build the stage for the new guys to show up and fire your ass just reeks
TenguPhule
Karma, just desserts, and all that.
Davis X. Machina
@General Stuck: There’s a native libertarian-crazy-GOP element up here that’s at war with the remnants of the goo-goo Republicans, that’s at war with the God-botherers.
If you get the right people angry at each other, and stay home — and the goo-goos may actually cross over — those numbers sound about right.
Look at whom we elect up here in mid-terms (turnout light) and quadrennial elections (turnout heavy).
Whole ‘notha ballgame
TenguPhule
The problem comes when the corporate facist-tongue bathing MSM dresses the vulture in a prom dress, applies lipstick and gives the feathers a perm and then declares her Miss America.
That’s how Compassionate Conservatism was born, remember?
gene108
@Jose Padilla:
From what I’ve learned, private equity firms don’t go after companies “on their last legs”.
They look for relatively stable companies, with solid cash flows that are undervalued for whatever reason.
For example, Jose’s Fashionbarn – a retail clothing store – is valued at 2x earnings, but the industry is averaging valuations at 4x earnings. Jose’s Fashionbarn doesn’t have a lot of debt and has steady cash flows for the foreseeable future.
The private equity firm would buy enough of Jose’s Fashionbarn to get enough control to do what it wants.
The PE Firm’s goal is to get the biggest return on their investment. Whatever is needed to get Jose’s Fashionbarn to value at or above the industry average is what they’ll do.
If Jose’s problem is they aren’t profitable enough, they’ll cut back on operating expenses, such as staff. If Jose’s expanded too fast, they’d close some locations. If the private equity firm needed to take out loans to buy Jose’s, they’ll push those loans onto Jose’s balance sheet.
Private equity firms aren’t into investments in any firm for the “long haul”. They want to make a quick buck.
I’m not really sure what economic purpose they serve, other than the fact they can exist and they make rich people richer.
Bubblegum Tate
@TOP123:
After many years of trying, yes, I did. Fuck that town.
rikyrah
tell the truth and shame the devil.
OGLiberal
“If Halperin and Politico say it’s not working, it’s working.”
I’ve been worried about this recently, in general. While Halperin haz a sad over the Bain stuff and is pulling his “good news for McCain” bs re: the ACA ruling, he’s been saying a lot of positive stuff about Team Obama, at least on The Page. Don’t know what he says on Morning Joe unless somebody posts a clip – can’t stand to watch the show and I’m on the train during that time anyway. To me, there hasn’t been enough, “this is good news for John McCain”, from Halperin during this cycle.
Then again, we’re talking about a guy who saw the Obama team’s “genius” and “inspired” selection of John Kerry as the Romney stand-in for debate prep as a sign that “Chicago has (at least some of) its mojo back”. Hmmm, selecting a rich, white, stiff Massachusetts senator to play a rich, white, stiff Massachusetts ex-governor in debate practice is “inspired” and “genius”? Not criticizing the Obama team’s choice – it was the right one. But the words I would use to describe it are more like “obvious” and “duh!”
Of course, in Halperin’s eyes they were getting their “mojo back” after that horrible Bain mistake, that long and boring (to Halperin and his buds) Ohio speech, and economic events in Europe over which Obama’s campaign team had zero control.
BTW, Halperin is coming close to admitting today that the Bain stuff might actually work because the NY Times and WaPo had stories showing that there is something there. But then he had to throw in a “good news for McCain” dig by saying that Chicago can’t be happy that the stories came our on Friday, the day on which Halperin and his crew can’t be asked to pay attention to something because, dammit, there are trips to the Vineyard to be scheduled!
gene108
@Southern Beale:
Outsourcing isn’t the same as off-shoring. It’s sort of like a square is a rectangle, but not all rectangles are squares.
For example, I work for a small company. It doesn’t make sense for us to keep anyone on payroll to clean the office. We outsource the work to our friendly cleaning lady.
Some company may not want to maintain people to handle all the state filings needed to run payroll, so they outsource the work to ADP or Paychex.
There are plenty of non-core business functions that should be outsourced, because it doesn’t make sense to do everything in-house.
Outsourcing and off-shoring are synonymous but they aren’t the same thing. There are plenty of American jobs, filled by Americans that exist because of outsourcing.
shortstop
@Walker: He’s always been a centrist tool.
TOP123
@Bubblegum Tate: Let us not forget that Ann Coulter is a denizen of these parts.
Or, perhaps… you are right, let us forget.
lovable liberal
Rmoney is not one of the Bobs. He’s Lumbergh.
But we’re not Peter either – more like Samir and Michael. Might have to aspire to be Milton…
Someguy
Have they been able to find POTUS on the golf course to see what he thinks about the success of the anti-elitism ads he’s running against Romney?
WaterGirl
@Steeplejack:I’ve been away – thanks for the link.
@piratedan: Stage immediately triggered the memory of my being asked by the newly hired boss to do a detailed write-up of all the interesting new initiatives I had started recently and what my plans were for everything in my small IT unit. As soon as I turned that in, I was let go. It made me sick, just as the guy said in Stage.
I’ve got money that says I am not the only person who watched that ad and was immediately brought back to the time that I had to build my own version of the stage.
shortstop
@Someguy: Damn! Throw some Tabasco in that weak sauce!
satby
@Steve in DC: Don’t kid yourself, these guys have been firing staff (they call it RIF: reduction in force) for the last few years anyway (disclosure: I work for one). This time they’ll just point at something else to blame.
anon
I went to elementary school with Mark Halperin. There were five black kids in our school. Two of them were the children of the junior groundskeeper at the Congressional Country Club golf course. Junior high school was just slightly more integrated, high school about the same.
Economically, the poorest people who went to our school were those groundskeeper kids. About 10% of the kids in school got cars for their 16th birthday. None of them had to work to help support their families.
I had a tough time learning to cope when I reached the wider world and the demographics were different, but I like to think I managed. I chose a career field that brought me into friendships that (I hope) transcend race or class.
Mark Halperin has never been in a situation where he would have had the chance to befriend someone whose family was currently living below median income. His contacts with lower income African-Americans are probably rare, fleeting, and terrifying or awkward.
There are things that he’s just not qualified to write about. This never stops him writing or talking about them, of course.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@TenguPhule:
Well there is that, because as we all know the definition of libertarian who pull himself by his boots straps and needs no governments socialism is a defense worker who retired from the military.
Spike
@butler: I suspect that the only line from Office Space that a typical Republican d-bag would find funny is “Na-ga…Na-ga…Na-ganna work here any more.”
Joey Maloney
@piratedan:
Or, more worrisome, how many Democratic voters they can prevent from voting.
ericblair
@satby:
Yes, and they’re not threatening to fire anybody; they’re threatening to send out WARN act notices. Since people working at defense contractors don’t generally live under rocks out in the wilderness, they’re completely aware of all of this right now, what happened during the sequestration battle and deal, so it won’t make any sort of difference.
They are not going to preemptively lay people off; that’s idiotic. If Lock-Mart has money on contract to execute work, they will retain those people and execute the work. If they don’t, they’ll put the people on the beach for a few weeks/months and let them go if they can’t find any new work. This is how it works right now, and none of that is going to change before November.
The Sailor
“Ever since the Obama campaign began its Bain hit”
I stopped right there. It confirms that there is nothing that “Sometimes NBC’s First Read is surprisingly smart”
It’s not a ‘hit’ if it’s the truth. What Mitt and his campaign says? Isn’t the truth.
Why do you even start, like all the MSM, with a false equivalence?
jefft452
@Steve in DC: “DOD contractors have said they are going to start firing their staff (LHM says 123,000) before the elections if defense spending gets cut. The corporations are really coming out swinging.”
If they can cut payroll without hurting the bottom line, they will lay-off whether defense spending gets cut or not
If they cutting payroll hurts the bottom line, they will not lay-off whether defense spending gets cut or not